With the current method of making business and greeting cards using a photographic printer to produce both the scene and the text or graphic, two problems occur. The first problem is that the information to be printed either must be written down and explained to the person producing the cards, so that direct contact or "face to face" communications is required. It is known in the art that information concerning the printing of the negative, such as color and density, can be recorded on another media such as magnetic tape or floppy disk. See U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,340,286, 4,215,920, 3,947,110, and 4,432,637. This, however, requires synchronizing the information on a separate magnetic media in such a way that it matches the photographic information on the film, and therefore is not a viable solution to the first problem.
Once the information has been conveyed, there is a second problem. The method used to print the business or greeting cards requires a set up procedure in which a lithograph (a negative) must be made of the text, logo, or sentiment portion of the card. The making of this negative is very time-consuming and requires expensive equipment. Because of this, the choices of sentiments offered by the photofinisher for greeting and business cards are very limited and the procedure does not allow for any print personalization such as the addition of a signature and/or family name. It also increases greatly the time between when a business card is ordered and when it is delivered.
After the negative of the text or graphic is made, it is placed in a special printer gate along with the photographic negative of the scene/or person and the two are printed side by side on photographic paper. If one wanted to change any of the information a new negative would have to be made which would require more additional expense and time.
The problem of conveying the customer's information to the photofinisher in an efficient manner can be solved by having the customer record the information at the retail counter directly on a magnetic coating on the film in the same area as the photographic image. The ability to record information on a magnetic coating on film is described in Research Disclosure 23935 entitled Automatic Makeover Printing System. The Business Card/Greeting Card Reorder Station enables the user to choose text, font, color of font and graphics, add personal messages or a signature and record these directly on the film, thus linking the negative to be printed with the information to create the business card or greeting card. The information is inputted by the user at the location were he/she drops off the order for processing. It can then be read by a photographic printer at a location remote from the retail counter. The photographic printer reads the magnetically encoded information recorded on the film and uses it to call up the correct information via a logic and control module and computer program so the graphics and text can be printed using a CRT onto the photographic paper along with the photographic scene of the negative.
By using a computer, the text, font, color of font, graphics, added personal messages, and/or signature can be created and retrieved using well-known graphics computer programs stored in computer memory, and printed onto the photographic paper along side of the negative image. If the text or graphics information needs to be changed at a later time, the computer file is simply updated and the new information printed. This system also allows the printing of one order after another without the need to change a negative containing the text or graphics. In addition, special instructions (such as instructions describing what flat artwork is to be scanned using a video camera and how it is to be printed next to the other images, or instructions specifying selected computer-generated images) can be read from the film and displayed.